Missing on Titanic – Search for submarine becomes a race against time

“We are using all available resources to ensure we can locate the ship and rescue those on board,” Mauger said. The Oceangate Expeditions company confirmed that people were on board. “We are reviewing and mobilizing all options to return the crew safely,” the statement said.

billionaire on board
The company occasionally takes private individuals for a great deal of money to the wreck of the 1912 Titanic, which lies on the bottom of the ocean at a depth of 3800 meters. Titan’s occupants are said to include British billionaire and adventurer Hamish Harding, who announced his participation on social media. The first thing to do now is locate the submarine on the surface or in the depths of the ocean, Commander Mauger said.

Multiple aircraft and ships would be deployed for this, as well as buoys with sonar on board, which can record sounds to a depth of almost 4000 meters. Only when the exact location of the boat is clear can a possible rescue be tackled. In the large-scale rescue operation, the US Coast Guard is working with Canadian troops and private boats and merchant ships at the suspected location about 1,500 kilometers east of the American metropolis of Boston.

Lost contact after almost two hours
The five missing persons – a pilot, an expert and three tourists – in the boat of the private company Oceangate Expeditions had started the dive on Sunday morning (local time), according to information. The crew of the Canadian escort ship Polar Prince lost contact after about an hour and 45 minutes. The submarine occasionally brings tourists to the Titanic from its home port of St. John’s on the Canadian island of Newfoundland for $250,000 per person. Strictly speaking, the Titan is a submarine, not a submarine, because it does not enter and leave ports under its own power. According to the company, the submarine is 6.70 meters long.

According to Oceangate, the company’s tours, which depart from the Canadian island of Newfoundland, last a total of eight days. The company recently announced that an expedition was underway. According to the media, the alleged British participant wrote that it will probably be the only such expedition this year.

Difficult to search in pitch-black deep sea
Ocean researcher Robert Blasiak of the Stockholm Resilience Center pointed out the difficult conditions in the search area. “The ocean is on average four kilometers deep, so this submarine is at a great depth,” Blasiak told the BBC. The light penetrates a maximum of one kilometer into the sea surface, so it is pitch black with a considerable water pressure at the same time. “We know where the Titanic is, but we don’t know where the submarine is. So it may not be nearly as deep and we should all hope for that at this point.

Speaking to the BBC, submarine expert Alistair Greig of University College London gave several possible scenarios for the incident. In the event of a power or communication failure, the submarine can be floated to the surface. The situation would be much worse if the hull was damaged and there was a leak. “Then the prognosis is not good,” said Greig.

‘Rescue ships can’t penetrate deep’
It would also be difficult if the submarine could no longer get off the seabed under its own power. “Even if the submarine is still intact, if it is deeper than 200 meters, there are very few ships that can go that deep, let alone divers,” said the expert. “Certainly, the vehicles designed for the Navy’s submarine rescue operations cannot come close to the depths of the Titanic. And even if they could, I highly doubt they would be able to cling to the tourist submarine’s hatch.”